From a Position of Power
by WynterRavenheart
Summary: "Do you…well…I mean…I could give you a massage?" (formatting fixed)


"Miranda what do you mean you don't know?" Shepard turned to the woman in question, her shoulder ached in a way it never had before, before the Alchera Incident.

"Your shoulder should be fine, for all intents and purposes," the woman said moving around the med bay, Chakwas had vacated to the crew quarters for the night, so when Shepard came complaining about the ache on her shoulder, the feeling of wrongness that left her kneading the muscle whenever possible, well it wasn't Chakwas that EDI had called.

Something had clearly gone wrong during reconstruction, the left shoulder had been constructed the same way as the right one, and it should be the right one hurting, for all intents and purposes, what with Shepard using that shoulder to balance the blasted Black Widow.

Miranda wanted to kill whoever had invented that damned sniper riffle.

"I don't know, Shepard, the surgery for both arm muscles was the same, the scans don't show anything, the stress tests don't either, it could be psychological." She sighed, staring at the woman sitting in front of her. Jane Shepard was a beautiful woman, all hard muscles and lean figure, a flair that showed how well command suited her and with a keen mind to boot.

It was no wonder two-thirds of the crew, ground team included, was half in love with her.

"Yeah no, my arm's fucked, it's a twinge, an ache, from neck to shoulder and partway between my shoulder blades," she grumbled with a roll of the offending shoulder. "Is there anything you could do to make it stop bothering me?"

Never let it be said that Miranda didn't count herself among those numbers, even grudgingly, or that she was one to miss an opportunity.

"Do you…" she breathed in, "well… I mean… I could give you a massage? Maybe?"

Shepard stared at her for a moment, eyebrow arched as she decided if Miranda had actually, really said that; green eyes measuring her.

"Okay, right here in the medbay?" She half-asked, half-sighed as she leaned back on the hard bed, the mattress was designed to help relax and aid healing therefore it was decidedly uncomfortable to lay on it.

"Here," Miranda agreed, her pulse quickening, palms suddenly sweaty, "or we could go to my quarters, my bed's decidedly more comfortable than the Med Bay's."

"Or we could go to mine." Shepard trailed off, head cocked to the side in apparent confusion.

"Please, yours has surveillance that goes directly to the Illusive Man." Miranda snorted, outright dismissing the idea with a careless wave of her fingers.

"Had," Shepard corrected with a smirk, she wasn't a grunt that couldn't handle tech, and those she missed Garrus had taken care of, Cerberus' surveillance hadn't stood a chance between the two of them.

"Shepard please, I saw-"

"What I wanted you to see," the Commander say with a dismissive shrug, "but if my quarters make you that uncomfortable then by all means," she waved for Miranda to lead the way, wincing as her shoulder throbbed in discomfort.

Miranda nodded once, turning off the medical scan before following Shepard through the 20 steps leading into her room, keeping from fidgeting, from stumbling, by sheer force of will.

"Where do you want me?" Jane said, her voice a pitch lower, almost a murmur, intimate.

Miranda felt her face flush and was momentarily glad that she kept her lights low on the night shift, a heat of desire pooling in-between her legs and another ache in the vicinity of her heart; the first she could deal with, the second not so much.

"On the bed please?" It's more of a suggestion than an order and Miranda mentally scolded herself for that, she was supposed to be in control, she was supposed to be able to handle this.

'Or not…' she couldn't help but bite her lip as Shepard moved past her, removing the top of her fatigues, leaving the Commander in only her cargo pants and a sports bra, the outline of a tattoo - recent, Miranda would've recalled her having one - partly hidden by the black strap, another one lower on her back, almost hidden; it was easy to see the first was an N7 tattoo the second one though, that got her curious.

As Jane Shepard moved, first to get her hair out of the way in a poorly made ponytail, and then to straddle the bed, Miranda let her thoughts wander; she knew the Commander's body inside and out, but only as a test subject, she took a deep breath and buried the thoughts of getting to know Shepard's body in more intimate ways.

"Miranda? Do you want me to leave?" Shepard asked, glanced at her X.O. over her shoulder, "I could just ask Chakwas for an analgesic." She smiled, a teasing quirk of her lips, an arch of her eyebrow before she made herself comfortable on Miranda's bed, a sigh escaping her lips as she made herself comfortable.

"There's no need Shepard," she almost snapped, catching herself at the last moment, it wasn't Shepard's fault that Miranda was harbouring an infatuation, well not really.

She moved to the bed as well, straddling the Commander's thighs and leaning forward, digging first with the tip of her finger and soon with her palm as she found the knot on Shepard's shoulder, ignoring the little grunt of pain from under her, refusing to imagine it cou-

"Ahh, there, right there," Shepard moaned as the pressure on her muscles loosened, a wave of relief spreading through her back and for a moment she could almost, almost, imagine her X.O. blushing as the sound. She felt the tips of her fingers stutter against her skin and she hid a pleased smile on the crook of her elbow; the pleased moans were part teasing, she couldn't help herself, and part because Miranda really did have magical fingers in more ways than one.

Maybe Shepard would let her have more, she had noticed the lingering looks, the discomfort, the almost misstep in her word; but not that night, that night was just for testing the waters, and so far Miranda was exceeding her expectations.


End file.
